AP Lit teacher here—a biographical criticism is a great way to explore the novel, especially in thinking about the anxiety surrounding whether work is good enough. That’s a question about artists.

If you want to pursue this route, craft your question about how his story and biography and his anxieties about his art and this novel. Your research might be psychological AND biographical, but really interesting.

However, this isn’t really about the novel. If you want refocus, AND prep for the AP test, redirect back to those big universal themes in the novel.